


Half Past 5

by Slother



Category: Rick and Morty
Genre: Angst, Angst and Feels, Gen, Inspired by Poetry, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-25
Updated: 2016-02-25
Packaged: 2018-05-23 05:57:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6107188
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Slother/pseuds/Slother
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Rick Sanchez has been gone for 17 hours. Morty doesn't know when he's coming back, or if he even will. This takes place after the events of the season 2 finale of Rick and Morty.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Half Past 5

**Author's Note:**

> Hi, this is my first fanfiction, so I hope you like it! It's very angsty and in a kind of poetic writing style, so there are some purposeful run-on sentences, and it might be a little confusing at first. Anyways, tell me what you think, and whether or not I should make another chapter.

Half past 5.  
Morty’s phone fell on his stomach. He did a bit of math on his fingers. Rick left 17 hours ago. The world around Morty was frozen, it seemed, as was his mind. He felt numb. He left his room, walking past where Jerry sat, his back leaning against Beth’s bedroom. Jerry’s head didn’t move, eyes still closed in utter confusion as to how his whole family could be so distraught over Rick. He knew that behind that door, the door that Jerry had knocked at until his knuckles turned red and voice went hoarse, behind that door that now had chipping paint, was his mother, surrounded by half the liquor cabinet and smashed bottles. Crying until her throat couldn’t force out any more sobs. Swallowing tear-swirled wine like air.  
Morty walked downstairs.  
Summer was slumped on the couch, wrapped in a blanket, wearing pajamas underneath. She stared at the TV, dried tears staining her cheeks. Her eyes were blank, but turned quickly to Morty when she heard the creaking stairs. The house had been utterly silent for hours. Neither of them spoke. Instead, fresh tears pricked at Summer’s eyes, glistening like glitter before falling freely. Neither of them made a sound. Morty kept walking, and Summer turned back to the TV, looking but not watching. Morty stepped through the kitchen and stood in front of the garage door.  
Upstairs, there was a crash. Some yelling. The sound of a door opening, crying, pounding feet following pounding feet downstairs. Beth ran to the bathroom, slammed and locked the door. A pill bottle opened, then another. Chugged Xanax, Zoloft, hydrocodone. Morty turned his back to the garage, and walked to the home phone calmly.  
911\. A distinctly alien voice answered immediately. Morty handed it to Jerry, who started yelling into it immediately in panic. Morty walked into the garage.  
He breathed in the scent of burning cotton, jet exhaust, flickering lights, moths, tobacco, alcohol, the air didn’t taste as sweetly as it had before, it burned his lungs with whiskey and fire but didn’t smell like Rick anymore. He inhaled even deeper, hoping to maybe get drunk from the air, to forget by remembering. His brain rushed, calm with so many thoughts of forgetting and flirting with the idea of doing something harmful like smoking or drinking or maybe using a scalpel on his arm or throwing himself off the roof or crashing the ship into an asteroid. But he was too drained to do anything at all. The walls breathed. They watched him, taunting with with their strength, _if we were as weak as you right now the house would fall on you._ Morty would be okay with that. They watched as he sat down on the dirty ground, covered with stains of vomit and blood and God knows what else, puddles of chemicals and gasoline and everything that smells like Rick, undoubtedly ruining Morty’s only suit that he still hadn’t taken off since the wedding. Sirens played outside, the front door opened, the bathroom door was opened, and Beth and Jerry and the alien paramedics left, maybe Summer too but Morty couldn’t tell, the noises insulated by the soundproof walls of his grandpa’s garage. He drifted to sleep.  
He woke back up at one fifteen in the morning.  
Morty’s world would be rehab for weeks. Rick was undoubtedly going through withdrawal, shaking and spitting and vomiting and confused, anxious, hot, heart skipping. Finally getting sober. Morty’s was guilt, shame, anger, denial, grief, silent tears and loneliness and longing. He wished he had one minute to go to Rick and say all the words that always went unsaid between them. The “I care about you”s and “I love you”s, they seemed to go without saying, but it still hurt that he never did. It hurt that Rick never had a chance to let his guard down, save from when he was blackout drunk and frankly terrifying. Those moments were always worst in the moment, but the best to think back to. The house was silent. Sobering. Empty, except for the young body lying amidst the scents of tears and regret and burning flesh, things that smelled so wonderfully alien and comforting. His lungs burning with sadness and the alcohol and gasoline in the air.  
The walls taunted him still, with the sturdy silence and soft breathing of Rick holding Morty’s shaking body close to his in tight alleyways as armed creatures passed by. The stillness of Rick’s passed-out body slumped over his desk in the small hours of the morning, when Morty had to watch very carefully for the slightest sign that he was still alive, fearing the worst had finally happened. As steadfast as Rick’s arm in front of Morty, shoving him behind his own wiry frame to keep him out of harm's way, Morty holding onto his steady, outstretched arm with a death grip.  
Morty stretched and stood up, reaching to the highest shelf in the room. He had to wheel over a chair to reach the bottles on top. Rick’s booze stash. He pulled down a glass bottle filled with foul-smelling, luminescent green alien alcohol that often filled Rick’s source of comfort. He opened it and placed the rim on his lips. It burned and tingled on his skin. He lifted the bottle slowly, and let the smallest amount onto his tongue. It burned, badly, stinging his tongue, like a cigarette butt being put out on his skin. He flinched slightly, but then let it settle in his mouth, not swallowing, but savoring the horrible flavor, putting the bottle back and stepping down from the chair. He lied on the ground again.  
The room finally smelled like Rick again.  
But he wasn’t there, and he wouldn’t come back for a long, long time, as far as Morty knew. For now, Morty could just lie on the ground and imagine the walls were Rick’s arms, holding him strongly and telling him how much he cared. That he wouldn’t leave again, that he was safe, that everything was normal again. And so Morty’s eyes drifted shut again, letting the alcohol finally wash down his throat, exhaling sharply to lessen the burning pain. And for a moment, he could swear Rick really was in the room.  
He didn’t know it at the time, but the Rick he knew wasn’t coming back.


End file.
